1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of creating a digest by use of a program video and the like of the present broadcasting, and a device and a program which execute the method. The present invention particularly aims at creating a digest without an effort.
2. Description of the Related Art
If broadcasting data of, for example, a baseball broadcast is broadcasted while including discrimination information of highlight scenes in the digital broadcasting, a receiving device can create a digest composed of the highlight scenes by accumulating received information. As a result, viewers can view a game in a digest format in a preferred time zone.
Further, the digest creation is necessary in the case of introducing summarized game contents in a segment of a sport program even in a broadcasting station.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 1997-65287 discloses a method of creating a digest by extracting and piecing replay videos included in a broadcasting video, as a simple method of creating a digest. A scene replayed in a broadcast is a part such as a scoring scene which is determined as important by the broadcast transmitting side, and therefore it is possible to automatically create a digest representing important scenes by extracting and piecing the replay videos.
However, since the replay videos are merely pieced in this case, the length (hereinafter, referred to as “scale”) of a digest is automatically set depending on the length of the replay scenes. As a result, the scale of the digest can not be adjusted. In order to adjust the scale, it is necessary that an importance degree is given to each scene and a scene to be included in the digest is selected on the basis of the importance degree.
Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2002-300518 discloses a digest creating method capable of adjusting the scale. In this method, the broadcasting station side transmits a program to which indexes for digest creation such as “enthusiasm degree” evaluated from cheers of spectators and “game parameter” indicating progress information of a game are added. A receiving device creates a digest by selecting a cut with a high evaluation value in accordance with the scale of the digest with the use of these indexes.
FIG. 35 schematically shows a digest creating device 110 that executes the method. The device 110 includes an input unit 120 to which information, as the “index information” such as “enthusiasm degree” and “game parameter” output from an input terminal 160 and production parameter information output from an editing device 170 and a switcher 180 are input, an importance degree computing unit 130 which computes the importance degree of each cut of a program on the basis of the index information, a digest creating unit 140 which creates digest information by selecting a cut with a high evaluation value in accordance with the scale, and an output unit 150 which outputs the digest information.
“Enthusiasm degree” is a value that is subjectively evaluated by an evaluator on the basis of an importance degree, a tension degree, and an enthusiastic status of spectators of a scene in a game, and the evaluator inputs the value with a terminal. “Game parameter” is information that indicates which is the offensive side or the defensive side and information that indicates scoring information, occurrence of a foul play, interruption of a game and the like. “Player information” is information that represents all players displayed on a screen. Further, “production parameter” is information that indicates a cut switching time, information that indicates whether or not a commercial is currently being broadcasted, information that indicates a start position and an end position of a replay, and the like.
The importance degree computing unit 130 performs weighting with respect to the input index information depending on preference information of a viewer and the like, and then the importance degree of each cut is obtained by adding the index information. The digest creating unit 140 selects cuts with high importance degrees until the length of the cuts reaches the pre-set digest length so as to create the digest information. The cuts designated in the digest information are selectively reproduced among accumulated video/sound data of a program, and the digest is displayed.
However, the method described in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2002-300518 involves a problem that the creation of the information such as “enthusiasm degree” added to a program incurs extremely high costs.
The present invention is to address such a conventional problem, and the object thereof is to provide a digest creating method in which a digest in accordance with a scale can be created in an extremely simple manner, and to provide a device and a computer program which execute the method.